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Sunday, July 30, 2006

Happy Birthday, Emily Brontë

Sunday, July 30, 2006 12:33 am by Cristina   4 comments
Born this day in 1818, Emily would become the so-called Sphinx of English Literature. Despite - or because of - her silence about herself she may be the Brontë sibling to have changed more with the times, and has been used to champion practically every cause. They even tried to get her own novel away from her!

We know precious little about Emily and that little usually has a mysterious air about it. Surely Emily was not conventional and not easily understood. Wuthering Heights proves that. When it comes to looking at Emily we not only study her from what we know about her but also by what we don't know: her Gondal prose written for many years - well into adulthood - along with Anne, her mysterious second novel, her imagination, her rambles on the moors, the reasons behind Wuthering Heights...

We humbly suggest that to celebrate her birthday you not only read her novel - or fragments of it - but also her poems, which are less well-known but in a way help us understand the mind that gave birth to such a powerful novel as Wuthering Heights and are a delight to read.

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4 comments:

  1. Anonymous7/30/2006 05:42:00 pm

    Dearest Emily, have also my warmest deeply felt wishes for your 188th Birthday. Your earth-life has unfortunately been too short endeed, but widely repayed by the greatness of your mind and intellect. From up there, please, observe and survey who’s continuing to appreciate your esteemed highest mental expressions through your survived human masterpieces ; thanks for them.-
    One of your strongest admirers (and BBS member); pray God for us.-
    EMILY, YOU’RE REALLY “ THE GREATEST “
    JANE BRONTE, THE IMMENSILY TRUE “UNCHAINED SOUL “ ! ! !

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  2. Anonymous7/31/2006 12:17:00 am

    Happy Birthday Emily -

    And Thou Art Dead, As Young and Fair.
    by George Gordon, Lord Byron

    And thou art dead, as young and fair
    As aught of mortal birth;
    And form so soft, and charms so rare,
    Too soon return'd to Earth!
    Though Earth receiv'd them in her bed,
    And o'er the spot the crowd may tread
    In carelessness or mirth,
    There is an eye which could not brook
    A moment on that grave to look.

    I will not ask where thou liest low,
    Nor gaze upon the spot;
    There flowers or weeds at will may grow,
    So I behold them not:
    It is enough for me to prove
    That what I lov'd, and long must love,
    Like common earth can rot;
    To me there needs no stone to tell,
    'T is Nothing that I lov'd so well.

    Yet did I love thee to the last
    As fervently as thou,
    Who didst not change through all the past,
    And canst not alter now.
    The love where Death has set his seal,
    Nor age can chill, nor rival steal,
    Nor falsehood disavow:
    And, what were worse, thou canst not see
    Or wrong, or change, or fault in me.

    The better days of life were ours;
    The worst can be but mine:
    The sun that cheers, the storm that lowers,
    Shall never more be thine.
    The silence of that dreamless sleep
    I envy now too much to weep;
    Nor need I to repine
    That all those charms have pass'd away,
    I might have watch'd through long decay.

    The flower in ripen'd bloom unmatch'd
    Must fall the earliest prey;
    Though by no hand untimely snatch'd,
    The leaves must drop away:
    And yet it were a greater grief
    To watch it withering, leaf by leaf,
    Than see it pluck'd to-day;
    Since earthly eye but ill can bear
    To trace the change to foul from fair.

    I know not if I could have borne
    To see thy beauties fade;
    The night that follow'd such a morn
    Had worn a deeper shade:
    Thy day without a cloud hath pass'd,
    And thou wert lovely to the last,
    Extinguish'd, not decay'd;
    As stars that shoot along the sky
    Shine brightest as they fall from high.

    As once I wept, if I could weep,
    My tears might well be shed,
    To think I was not near to keep
    One vigil o'er thy bed;
    To gaze, how fondly! on thy face,
    To fold thee in a faint embrace,
    Uphold thy drooping head;
    And show that love, however vain,
    Nor thou nor I can feel again.

    Yet how much less it were to gain,
    Though thou hast left me free,
    The loveliest things that still remain,
    Than thus remember thee!
    The all of thine that cannot die
    Through dark and dread Eternity
    Returns again to me,
    And more thy buried love endears
    Than aught except its living years.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous7/31/2006 07:43:00 pm

    Estimator - you truly are passionate about Emily! :)

    Tattycoram - very fitting poem. Thanks for sharing!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous8/01/2006 07:56:00 am

    Dearest Cristina, your name & “estimator “are both Italian.-
    Yes, you’re quite right, dear; I follow constantly your fabulous blog-insertions
    very even-minded, well-balanced; the one on Emily is simply fantastic, as I believe you caught all the facetings
    of such a sensible,solitary, complex, highly minded, amiable creature; I try to imagine her “unchained Soul”
    freely flying high-high much over the highest white-snowed tops of the Andes Mountains ‘totally FREE” , maxim wing-spread, in open large silent turnings, slightly up & down, a real dominator in human free-thinking.- That’s “my beloved Emily Jane Bronte “, Cathy-Heathcliff ‘s sweet genitrix.- And you’ve perfectly understood it, Cris.- Many thanks.-
    - the truly passionate Estimator -

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